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Overcoming Urgency
Chapter
1.3 (Overcoming Obstacles)
Draft 04/01/09
"The best use you can make of a
Blackberry is to buy them for all of your competitors. They'll never have time
for another creative thought."
– Bo Peabody
I had dinner with a friend, a VP of
a successful organization, who demonstrated how easy it is to slip into a
pattern where urgency rules.
During the meal, he excused himself several times to respond to his
Blackberry. Returning to the table
one time, he commented, “We (meaning the senior management of his organization)
like stay in touch with each other throughout the evening. In fact,” he added, “it’s not unusual
to be sending or receiving emails after midnight.” He felt good about this because he knew that he was part of
a high commitment team.
In response to a question from me,
he also noted that the entire executive team routinely works in the office on
Saturdays. The CEO comes in, so
everyone else follows suit.
Later on, as we were having
dessert, he mentioned how much he enjoys bike riding. Then he added something that got me thinking. He said, “You know, a lot of my very
best ideas come after about 30 miles into a ride. When I get in the flow of cycling, my mind starts to wander,
and I make connections between ideas that wouldn’t occur to me otherwise.”
I bit my tongue, but I immediately
thought: “Wow, your organization would be a lot smarter to pay you to bicycle
than to work evenings and weekends.”
My friend, who is bright, insightful, energetic, and committed, did not
make this connection himself. His
talents are underutilized not because he does not work hard enough, but because
he is so compelled by loyalty and a sense of urgency that he allows less
important matters to pre-empt the time that could be spent on larger issues.
Steven Covey has described the
issue as well as anyone I know.
Your tasks can be categorized on two scales simultaneously – urgency and
importance. Many people do not
make that distinction, however, so they confuse urgency with importance. They treat everything that is urgent as
if it were also important when the opposite is often true. Frequently, the most important tasks
are not urgent ones, but rather ones that have long time frames associated with
them. Working on important
tasks frequently requires discipline and foresight because action can be
deferred without immediate consequences.
The difference between the important and the urgent is like the
difference between doing your reading and schoolwork during a college semester
to master an academic subject and cramming the night before an exam in order to
pass the test. The first results
in learning and usually good grades; the second focuses on the grade and leaves
learning out of the picture.
Here is how Covey describes this
problem: “Urgent matters are usually visible. They press on us; they insist on action…. We react to urgent matters. Important matters that are not urgent
require more initiative, more proactivity…. If we don’t have a clear idea of what is important, of the
results we desire in our lives, we are easily diverted into responding to the
urgent.”
Focusing on the urgent limits
important learning opportunities.
Here are some clues on how to
differentiate the urgent from the important.
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Urgent
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Important
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- Immediate
- A tangible action or decision
- Calls for reaction
- Limited scope of impact
- Situation dependent
- Often directed by others
- See it.
Do it. Done.
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- Long-term
- Often a concept, idea, or proposal
- Requires planning
- Broad scope of impact
- Person, not situation, focused
- Often self-initiated
- Perceive.
Consider. Plan. Undertake. Review.
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What about circumstances that are
both urgent and important? Most of
us would place such situations at the top of our priority lists since they meet
two criteria for our attention.
Covey suggests that we reconsider our evaluation of these based on the
insight that important matters can be managed best before they become
urgent. Counter to normal common
sense notions, he gives greater weight to important but not urgent activities than to important and urgent ones.
To be a leader and to learn the most from your experience requires that
you overcome the tyranny of the urgent and devote sufficient attention to long
term, substantive issues that will make an impact on your life and the lives of
others.
Application: Remember, not all urgent matters are important. And important matters are best dealt
with before they become urgent. As
you plan your weekly calendar, build in one or more blocks of time to work on something
that is important but not urgent.
Your rate of learning and the scope of your impact will both increase.
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